In his regular job, Brad Slater is a train conductor for the Canadian National Railway Company, but after performing this miracle rescue, he is now a hero and an angel to one special family.

On an early December morning, Brad reported to work with the train engineer William Munsey in Wainwright, Alberta. The temperature hovered around a chilly -35C and the two men crew was assigned to take CN train Q199 from Wainwright to Edmonton.

While the two-engine Q199 waited for its turn to depart, Brad decided to do a quick walk through with his flashlight and make sure things were in good working order especially on such a bitter cold morning. What he heard next, was chillier than the weather that morning. He immediately called on engineer Munsey who suspected the worse!

"I thought the previous crew had run over somebody or he found an arm or leg or something. I've heard that voice before, and it's not very good."

To their horror and surprise, what they found what still alive! Curled up underneath the second engine above the wheel was a tabby cat crying and nearly frozen to death! Brad still recalls the cat's dire call for help,

The two men immediately got the desperate cat out from under the engine and into the train. They wrapped the male cat in a t-shirt for warmth and offered it some water and jerky. A closer inspection of the feline revealed a missing tooth, missing part of its right ear, and paws dotted with frostbite. Clearly the little guy had endured a lot more than just the weather!

Brad named the cat Q199, Q for short, after the train, and took him home to his wife and three other cats in Edmonton. Given the sad state of health, Brad even took Q to a vet the next morning just to make sure he would recover alright.

At home, Brad noticed Q recovering well and with his growing affection towards the family, it was clear to Brad that the cat wasn't just a stray. After using social media to find the owners, Brad finally heard from a couple in Melville, Saskatchewan who sent him pictures of their cat named "Tiger" who looked very similar to Q. As fate would have it, the couple were retired CN employees who had found and rescued Tiger, now dubbed Q, from the CN rail yards. The ending was certainly bitter sweet for Brad,

"As soon as I heard that, I broke down. At first, I wanted to keep denying it, trying to find a reason it wasn't him, but I was seeing they were similar between the ear; his back leg is white."

Brad of course, doesn't believe he did anything out of the ordinary. His decision to take care of the cat was simply his instinct to follow the golden rule and do what he would have wanted any stranger to do had one of his cats gone missing. For the retired couple however, Brad certainly went above and beyond in showing so much care and affection to their Tiger. And even though the goodbye was hard, Brad is happy that Tiger/Q will be safe and in a loving home again.